Greasing the pasta

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

Most of my sauces are not fat-based but most do contain some fat in the form of cream or meat.

[East Coast Hustle]

Yeah, but that won't overcome the water-solubility. but like I said, if the kids dig it then it's really just a minor point of science and snobbery.

[Triple Zero]

Still doesn't explain how her mostly-water-based sauces still stick to animal-fat-greased pasta, though. Unless the effect is minimal, and it sticks just a littlebit less, but not enough to be a problem.

What I wonder is why grease the pasta at all, and not just add the extra fat to the pasta-sauce right away? Does that make a difference to the taste, Nigel?

[Suu]

Probably so she can make a vat of us that the kids can attack and not worry about it congealing into a lumpy mess they may not be able to control.

[Triple Zero]

Eh? A vat of us?

[East Coast Hustle]

my understanding is that Nigel's kids will all eat the noodles but all have different sauces that they will or won't eat with those noodles, so oiling the noodles allows her to hold them warm and portion them out without them sticking together in unappealing clumps.

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

Yes.

Here's how it works. I make a nice sauce and a pot of noodles. One kid wants sauce. One kid is still at Starbucks with her friends. One kid just wants cheese. Boyfriend is still in Clackamas teaching a class. Greasing the noodles means that instead of standing in the kitchen making batch after batch of fresh noodles, I can serve myself and whoever else is there/ready and then get back to what I was doing, leaving the rest of the noodles in the pot ready to serve without cooling into a repulsive, inedible congealed mass. They can also easily be warmed up for seconds.

One difference between my kitchen and a restaurant is that I don't have a line cook and I sure as fuck am not going to be one.

Animal fat does have a distinctly different viscosity than vegetable fat, so that probably helps. I especially notice the difference with heavily sausagey sauces and cream-based sauces like the fish sauce the kids love so much.

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

I don't use vegetable oil on pasta partly because I don't like what it does to the sauce and partly because I can't stand the taste. I dislike vegetable oil in most applications, actually. It's pretty gross. Cold-pressed seed and nut oils are OK for certain things, but for the most part, it's lard or GTFO. I get a huge pot of it every year when the Darrels do their annual pig roast; they give me the carcass for stewing and rendering, and I end up stocking my freezer with gallons of the best broth in the world and pounds of deliciously smoky lard.

[East Coast Hustle]

pounds of deliciously smoky lard.

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

Totally. It cannot be replaced with ANYTHING. It's well worth roasting a young hog once a year for no other reason, IMO.